The aim of this project is to build on the experience gained on the EPAPP project. That project, funded by the Leverhulme trust, allowed us to develop a volume of some 250 inscriptions, using the Epidoc markup principles; the Inscriptions of Aphrodisias grant allowed us to further refine the volume and publish it as http://insaph.kcl.ac.uk/ala2004/.

In the course of that process we learned a great deal about how to develop and apply the guidelines; we also established some very good relationships with other scholars in the field. Our intention now is to develop the use of Epidoc markup not only for the eventual publication of inscriptions, but also as a tool for editing them and preparing them for publication. We also intend to work closely at every stage with other colleagues and other projects, so that we can support one another in developing our approaches to electronic publication, and achieve a reasonable level of compatibility between projects.

On this site we intend to publish more material from Aphrodisias, as it becomes ready for publication. At the same time, the editors of the inscriptions, Angelos Chaniotis (in Heidelberg) Joyce Reynolds (in Cambridge) and Charlotte Roueche (in London) together with the excavators, Christopher Ratte (in New York) and Bert Smith (in Oxford) intend to use the web as a work area for preparing increasing amounts of material for publication. We may well not be able to publish all the inscriptions of Aphrodisias in this way before the end of the project: but we should by then have established the guidelines and the protocols for doing so.